But let me start from the beginning. On the second day in Tasmania Patrick and I booked a diving trip. It was cold and rainy on that day and the water temperature around freezing 12°C. As we had already made an appointment with the dive instructor and had no reception on our phones we had to go. When he asked us whether we wanted to cancel the diving, we discussed for five minutes deciding to do it anyway. Due to the terrible conditions Mikkel and Jimmy decided to turn down the offer to join us on the boat, so the instructor, Patrick and I headed out alone.
On the boat the instructor told us he would not be coming down with us and so we had to do our first cold water dive alone. The dive was not fun at all, as we were not used to being without an instructor and the conditions under water were terrible. When we got back up I was seriously considering cancelling the second dive as I had a head ache and was freezing.
This was the moment a second boat called to tell us that they spotted two whales and hundreds of dolphins just a few kilometres away. Off course we did not want to pass this chance, not knowing what was about to happen to us…
We reached the dolphins after about 5 minutes and about 10 started swimming with the boat jumping next to our boat. When Patrick asked whether we could stop to take some pictures the dive instructor said “Forget about the dolphins, we are heading for the whales”.
Once we saw the whales jumping in a distance we knew he was right, although we were still fascinated be the dolphins swimming only centimetres away from our feet as we were sitting in the front of the boat now.
The couple of hump back whales was on their way to Antarctica to mate there and made a stop for the sea-life tourist boat that had contacted us. After circling around the whales
for about five minutes the dive instructor asked whether we wanted to go swimming with them as we were still wearing our wet suit. It took less than 20 seconds for me to get the fins and mask on and get into the water. I was surrounded by a bunch of dolphins right away and almost had to tell them to get out of the way as I was heading for the whales.
My heart was pounding like crazy when I put my head under water and saw the two gigantic whales pass by around 2 meters away! Amazed by this first encounter I got back on the boat, where Patrick was still putting on his fins. But we were not finished yet…
We went in front of the whales to do it again and maybe get a shot with Patrick’s under water camera. I was so excited already when we got into the water a second time, this time with Patrick and the camera. We were swimming in the middle of the ocean and could not see any sign of the whales when the instructor screamed from the boat: “They are coming towards you!”
When I put my head under water I could not believe what I was seeing. They were right underneath us! Seeing these enormous creates swimming underneath us and disappearing in the dark of the depth was one of the most incredible experiences in my traveling career.
When we lifted our heads over water we both started screaming and yelling like we had lost our mind. But we were not finished yet….
We got into the boat again to jump in the water for a third and last time. This time the whales stayed over water and we got within touching distance!! Patrick was right between them when he took these amazing pictures. In our excitement we did not hear the dive instructor screaming at us not to go that close, as the whale’s tale could easily kill either one of us.
So, we just enjoyed the few seconds till the whales disappeared, knowing that we will probably not get that close to a whale in our life again….
Back in the boat the dive instructor said he was quite worried about us, as the humpbacks “can get pretty aggressive” and one of them “tried to turn over a boat last week”. For us it did not matter, as nothing good change the happiness we felt at that moment...
Read more about the humpback whale on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humpback_Whale
No comments:
Post a Comment